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<h1><a href="https://archiveofourown.org/works/29853057">a point of no return</a> by <a class='authorlink' href='https://archiveofourown.org/users/minirovks/pseuds/minirovks'>minirovks</a></h1>

<table class="full">

<tr><td><b>Category:</b></td><td>Five Nights at Freddy's, Homestuck</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Genre:</b></td><td>Character Study, Cheating, Crack, Crack Crossover, Crack Treated Seriously, Crossover, Crossover Pairings, Crossovers &amp; Fandom Fusions, Implied/Referenced Cheating, Infidelity, M/M, Not Beta Read, Not Canon Compliant, Out of Character, but listen. it's funny. okay. let me have this</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Language:</b></td><td>English</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Status:</b></td><td>Completed</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Published:</b></td><td>2021-03-05</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Updated:</b></td><td>2021-03-05</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Packaged:</b></td><td>2021-05-15 23:47:21</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Rating:</b></td><td>General Audiences</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Warnings:</b></td><td>No Archive Warnings Apply</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Chapters:</b></td><td>1</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Words:</b></td><td>986</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Publisher:</b></td><td>archiveofourown.org</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Story URL:</b></td><td>https://archiveofourown.org/works/29853057</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Author URL:</b></td><td>https://archiveofourown.org/users/minirovks/pseuds/minirovks</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Summary:</b></td><td><div class="userstuff">
              <p>The most common misconception about cheating, Dave thinks, is that it only happens to stupid people. Dave isn’t the smartest, but he’s not stupid. He’s not oblivious.</p><p>or</p><p>Five times Dave couldn’t bear to look Karkat in the eyes and one time he could.</p>
            </div></td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Relationships:</b></td><td>Dave Strider/Karkat Vantas, Karkat Vantas/Foxy</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Comments:</b></td><td>4</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Kudos:</b></td><td>8</td></tr>

</table>

<a name="section0001"><h2>a point of no return</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_head_notes"><b>Author's Note:</b><ul class="associations">
      <li>For <a href="https://archiveofourown.org/gifts?recipient=that+one+person+i+played+minecraft+with+a+couple+times">that one person i played minecraft with a couple times</a>.</li>



    </ul><blockquote class="userstuff">
      <p>hi. so. uh. yeah. this is like the third thing i've written in this genre, and by this genre i mean a very bad fake character study that i write in an hour at ten at night or whatever. i cannot make excuses for myself anymore. at this point the fact that i do not write rpf is kind of my only redeeming trait. anyway. yeah</p><p>oh also the title is taken from teenager in love by neon trees because nothing is sacred to me i guess</p>
    </blockquote></div><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p>One common misconception about cheating, Dave thinks, is that it only happens to stupid people. You don’t have to be a genius to figure out something’s up with the love of your life. And it’s not like cheating is such an uncommon thing, either — Dave’s heard the stories, tried (with varying levels of success) to console his own friends after they realized how their partner had betrayed them, and even if he hadn’t, he’d know about it from movies, or music, or something. And if you think about it from that point of view, actually, it’s not even that big of a thing. He’s overreacting, thinking too much about it when it’s not even that deep. It’s not unique or important. It happens all the time. People deal with it. He should learn to deal with it, too.</p><p>The point is that it happens. It’s not super rare or whatever, and it isn’t just a result of incompetence. Dave isn’t the smartest, but he’s not stupid. He’s not oblivious.</p><p>~</p><p>The first time he sees Karkat and Foxy together, he’s paralyzed. Frozen. Inert.</p><p>The <i>five stages of grief</i>, of all things, are the first things he jumps to. Stage one: denial and shock. He sees what’s happening in front of him, but he can’t process it. There’s an element of surrealness to it in that, for one thing, he doesn’t even know where the fox robot came from (but given how many aliens he’s met at this point, who’s he to question that?), and for another…well. That’s Karkat. Knight of Blood, defender of unity. It doesn’t make sense. It doesn’t sink in that this is reality. </p><p>And then it does. And — <i>They’re just all over each other, aren’t they</i>, he thinks — their eyes are screwed shut, so unaware and lost in their own senses; they’re falling together and merging like living waterfalls, powerful and deliberate and sure. Dave would almost envy them if he were able to do anything other than watch in somber silence. He doesn’t know what to do. He doesn’t even know what he could do.</p><p>~</p><p>The second time he sees them, interrupting them crosses his mind briefly. How would you even go about that, actually — <i>heyyyyyy, Karkat, the guy I literally had to cross the space-time continuum to even meet, let alone date, I saw you making out with this, like, robot fox dude, and I was just wondering</i> — yeah, he cuts the thought off there, forcing a snort at his own pathetic attempt at a joke. But that only proves what he was already thinking — that there’s no good way to go about it, so he can’t. He won’t.</p><p>Eventually, he walks away. He hears them carrying on as he exits, like they didn’t notice, like he wasn’t even there in the first place. It stings being unseen, even though he knows it was his decision, or lack thereof, that let them do that. Some unidentified feeling wells in his stomach something that would leave a bitter, acidic, bile-like taste on his tongue, something entirely stupid and overreactive given what’s actually happening. It’s his fault. He has no right to regret it. God, he’s such a fucking hypocrite.</p><p>~</p><p>The third time, they still don’t see him and he’s almost used to it. What do waterfalls care about humans, beings they could thrash and overwhelm in a matter of minutes? He’s a pinprick of a soul to the grand passion theirs possess. Maybe that’s why he can’t bear to come between them — he’s scared he’d drown. Dave isn’t stupid, but he might be a coward. That might be worse.</p><p>~ </p><p>The fourth, he almost breaks. It’s so much easier to notice the details now that he’s over his initial shock — Foxy is looking at Karkat, and even with one eye covered in the opaque fabric of an eye patch, Dave can tell it’s with admiration.</p><p>Karkat stifles a soft laugh as he tips his head back. Dave flinches. If Karkat had looked just a few degrees further, he would’ve seen Dave, looked him right in the eye. Even when he doesn’t, Dave ducks his head for security. He doesn’t want to risk it. <i>It’s fine. Whatever.</i> It’s a mantra he’s gone over so many times in his mind, whether he’s stumbled upon Karkat and Foxy recently or it’s just come back in his dreams. He doesn’t have a right to regret. What does it matter to him if Karkat has an affair? He can’t stop that. What is he gonna do, try to collect all the water in the ocean in his tiny, meaningless, mortal bowl? It would be futile. He shouldn’t even bother.</p><p>~</p><p>The fifth, when he looks at them, all shadowed skin and sun-spotted joints, he doesn’t think anything. <i>It’s fine</i>, he mutters to himself, <i>whatever</i>, and it doesn’t feel like an empty sentiment. Dave isn’t stupid. He’s only oblivious when he wants to be.</p><p>~</p><p>One common misconception about cheating is that it tears your relationships apart. That hasn’t happened to Dave and Karkat yet, although, granted, it’s a lot easier for him to ignore it when Karkat ignores it too. Dave’s caught them by accident five times, and despite how careful he is to remain invisible, something has to have given him away — a floorboard creaking, a breath too heavy — and Karkat has to know Dave knows. He’s just not bringing it up, and Dave finds himself fine with that. What do you do in the face of deluge? You go with the flow. You don’t contradict it.</p><p>Still, he has to admit it shows. Their dialogue is a little colder. “I love you,” Karkat will say, and Dave will echo, “Yeah.” <i>You too.</i></p><p>It’s supposed to stop there. This time, Karkat taps him on the shoulder, brow lowered and eyes squinted. “Dave? Hey. Look at me.”</p><p>He does, cracking the corners of his mouth up into a brief smile.</p>
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